Horizontal Gene Transfer Author:Clarence I. Kado In the past few years there have been an increasing number of observations of naturally occurring horizontal gene transfer. DNA elements have been observed transferring into and between higher organisms, such as plants, fungi and metazoans, including humans. The notion of movement of gene from one species to another has until recently been ... more »considered merely an oddity of the life of some micro-organisms or a series of tricks that research geneticists have played on unsuspecting laboratory animals. Today, however, horizontal gene transfer is a rapidly growing area of research and has a variety of academic and practical implications in areas such as taxonomy, epidemiology, agriculture and human health. Ultimately, the phenomena of horizontal gene transfer has the potential to profoundly affect fundamental concepts of evolutionary theory. For the first time evidence and material pertaining to horizontal gene transfer among all of life's kingdoms are brought into one volume. An international list of contributors, each of whom is a scientist with active research programs in the area of natural horizontal gene transfer, describes the latest findings. These include experimental evidence from microbiology, and Drosophila melanogaster, as well as evidence from molecular evolution studies. The potential explanatory power of horizontal gene transfer is explored as it relates to the fields of plant and metazoan taxonomy, palaeontology and phylogenetic reconstruction. This book will be of interest to any researcher in medical or biological sciences whose work is affected by horizontal gene transfer, as well as scientific researchers from government and industry concerned with the release of genetically modified organisms.« less